The last week before the national team games and we saw the tie at the top remain. This battle between Benfica and Porto has been and will be EPIC! It's great to see the league competitive and two great rivals duke it out until the end. Benfica have been the better team since the turn of the new year, but Porto are a more experienced and smart team that will not let this run away. They want to repeat as champions!
Here are the results from Week 26:
Sporting 1 Santa Clara 0
Setubal 0 Braga 1
Belenenses SAD 2 Portimonense 2
Guimaraes 3 Boavista 1
Porto 3 Maritimo 0
Nacional 0 Rio Ave 1
Aves 0 Chaves 1
Moreirense 0 Benfica 4
Tondela 1 Feirense 1
Standings
1. Benfica 63
2. Porto 63
3. Braga 58
4. Sporting 55
5. Guimaraes 42
6. Moreirense 42
7. Belenenses SAD 38
8. Santa Clara 32
9. Rio Ave 32
10. Portimonense 32
11. Maritimo 27
12. Aves 26
13. Boavista 26
14. Nacional 26
15. Setubal 25
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16. Tondela 25
17. Chaves 24
18. Feirense 15
Benfica had a very tough match at Moreirense. It was never expected that eagles would go to a tough camp against the Cinderella story of the championship and win 4-0. Congrats to Benfica on a massive, massive win that was much needed after a difficult home draw. Porto also deserves congratulations for a big home win against an always-difficult Petit-led Maritimo.
Sporting and Braga continue their great dual for third, and if Braga manages to beat Porto in the next round then suddenly they're back in the championship talk. Nothing much to say here as both teams are lucky to win.
With the Moreirense loss, Guimaraes moves ahead of them to 5th place. Guimaraes wants to show they're 5th and they have finally worked themselves back up. Belenenses SAD is only 4 points back. Watch out for them: with the year this club has had this is a shocking year for them. Silas is headed the right way.
As for the relegation battle, it feels like it gets tighter by the week. 11th through 17th is separated by THREE points! Two of these teams will be relegated. It's safe to say that Rio Ave, Santa Clara and Portimonense are with a bit of a gap and given the sheer quantity of teams at the bottom and historically the number of points required to stay up these three teams are going to remain up. Maritimo is isolated in the 11th position and between the teams at the bottom this appears to be the team most likely to move up and remain up. From Aves down to Chaves, everything is open. Nacional is the team that cannot afford to be tied because their goal difference is the worst. The way they're playing, they're very very lucky to be above the cut-off line. The reason they're above it is because Setubal has now gone 15 games without a victory. Yet somehow Setubal is also above the line! Tondela is below and has been playing an awful brand of soccer. So awful they tied at home to last place Feirense. Feirense has a very small hope of going on a massive win streak, so it's most likely they'll be relegated. Chaves, however, look to be trending in the right direction. One point at a time, Chaves appear to be stronger than the majority of lower teams, and should be able to move ahead with the quantity of games left. They are now only 1 point back of safety. Aves and Boavista are also above the line, and while both teams are not very good they should be good enough to stay. But we never know what will happen!
Next round, we have no games or times yet because of this national team break. There will be a Braga-Porto, which should be crucial for the championship.
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